OUTDOORS: Trout tales  magic and mayhem on opening day

It’s a rite of spring.Reconnecting with nature and the musky high of manly-man camaraderie makes it a day of anticipation, especially giving a nod to life’s growing column of yesterdays.

What could be a more idyllic picture than a man sallying forth to do battle with wily critters in hopes of proudly carting home dinner?

The great provider he is, ignoring the fiscal facts that all the money he spent on gear, licenses, gas, lodging, food and drink said trout fillets probably cost the household budget about 20 bucks a pound.

Trout season opens this Saturday (April 6) in New Jersey, started in 18 Pennsylvania counties — including Bucks — this past Saturday, and will open Monday in New York, appropriately April Fool’s Day.

And fools rushed in one opener on the fabled Beaverkill while ice chunks the size of Volkswagens bobbed down the stream and jammed up at Junction Pool.

But we were there for tradition’s sake. Opening day in Roscoe, N.Y. (Trout Town, USA) was a big deal, covered by the outdoor writers from all three New York City daily papers. A photographer was whisked in by helicopter to shoot the festivities.

Meanwhile, we froze our fannies off, didn’t catch diddly and were three-deep at the bar at the Antrim Lodge by 10 a.m.

Trouble with a fishing trip, as my uncle the doctor used to say, is “that some damn fool always wants to go fishing.”

They called the Antrim bar, “Mahogany Ridge.” More deer were shot there and bigger trout netted than any other place in the Catskills.

Up on the Flatbrook years ago we decided to play princes of men — we three Jarhead cronies — and take our kids out for an opening day adventure. Tears of joy flowed from grateful wives.

It rained with ferocious intensity, the steam gushing and roaring over its banks until normally still pools churned the color of a chocolate milkshake.

Say, kids, how do you feel about cheeseburgers and soda?

The now defunct Layton Hotel was packed with soaked anglers seeking shelter, and a few shooters, from the storm.

Fishing is supposed to be a contemplative endeavor, sitting on the shoreline watching a bobber in the little lake for any signs a fish may be interested in your offering. I often take a book and indulge in a pipe packed with good Virginia burley.

But opening day, before the rules made it possible to fish for trout year-round in certain waters, used to be about as contemplative as a cross between the Sacking of Rome and the Charge of the Light Brigade.

It’s still possible to have some nitwit sling a spinner across your line, splash into a favorite pool in front of you, or come armed with tackle that could whip a hammerhead shark into submission, rather than a tiny trout wand to match the quarry at hand.

Things seem to have calmed down in these years of liberal seasons and opening day has a lot do to with a family outing…dads and their kids, old-timers taking their grandchildren out for some time together, that will no doubt not be forgotten by either generation.

I have pictures I fondly gaze at in melancholy moments of me and my son and daughter with our silly grins and hand-held just-caught fish from the Musky, Round Valley and our little Pennsylvania lake.

Memories are made of this.And this too: Slip-sliding down a mud-slickened bank of a New Jersey stream on an opening day about 15 years ago I bounced off trees and rocks and wound up with a torn rotator cuff.

I never had surgery and the shoulder bothers me in cold and raw weather to this day.

Why the slip and fall?We had camped at water’s edge and fired up the grill long before the 8 a.m. starting time.

For someone who normally has a piece of toast or bowl of Cheerios for breakfast, consider that rashers of bacon were sizzling, sliced potatoes and onions were frying, biscuits were rising in a Dutch Oven and Bloody Marys were being mixed by the pitcher.

It was a normal opening day.Thus, with enough greasy food to gag a Cape Buffalo in my belly, the demon drink blurring my vision and reflexes, I wobbled forth to make my first cast — and nearly ended up in one.

The brain of a trout is about as big as a pea; the average fisherman’s? Think cantaloupe.

Pea-brain usually wins.Have fun Saturday, but be careful out there.

— Contact me at rikwrite@aol.com and check the Out in the Open Blog for more good stuff.